by Susi Fox
‘Yes,’ I say, clutching at my thighs to hide the tremor in my hands. ‘I’m sure both of our babies will be just fine.’
Day 3, Monday Evening
Twilight settles into violet night as I fold the baby-blue cardigan from my father, nestling it on the top shelf of my cupboard. Mark slides his head around the doorframe of my room.
‘I’ve got something for you.’
‘Isn’t it past visiting hours?’
He sidles over the threshold and hands me a green shopping bag, then places a large Tupperware container on the bedside table. His hand is like a spider, creeping around my waist.
‘Conjugal visit,’ he says.
‘No, thanks.’ I push him away.
‘Sorry, Sash. I was joking. Obviously.’ He tries to smile.
I tip the contents of the green shopping bag onto my bed. Tiny white cotton jumpsuits, still with the discount store price tags on: three for the price of one. He could have done worse, I suppose; the clothes could all be in shades of blue.
‘Can you please bring in some clothes for me, too?’
He proudly pulls a small leather bag from behind his back, filled with skirts, beaded jumpers and heels from home, as though I’m at a medical conference, not in a psychiatric institution. At least he’s brought in my favourite black leather handbag.
‘Thanks,’ I say. ‘Maybe some more trackpants and T-shirts, too?’
‘Of course. I’ll bring them tomorrow.’ He points to the Tupperware container. ‘Apricot slice. I thought you’d like it.’ Then he points to the TV. ‘Would you mind? It’s a very special occasion. It’s the first time in nineteen years Collingwood’s got this far. I only want to watch the last five minutes, then I’ll switch it off, I promise.’
I ease open the lid of the container. The top of the slice is glistening, with chunks of apricot protruding. I bite into a piece, expecting the familiar moistness. Instead my teeth catch on thick dough.
‘Did you leave out the bicarb soda?’
He’s reclining on my bed, arms splayed under his head for a better view of the TV.
‘I hope not.’
‘You know you won’t be able to make this sort of mistake in your café,’ I say in what I hope is a mock-serious tone. Organismic, he’s called the organic food café he’s been dreaming of; he’s even registered the business name. Yet each time he’s got a little further with the business plan, or begun scouting out venues, he’s found excuses to delay: a sick relative, a busy work project or one of my miscarriages. I’ve encouraged him, badgered him, even threatened to move forward with the plans myself. He has steadfastly resisted my calls to action. Sometimes I’ve wondered if he’s avoiding plunging into it because he’s afraid to fail in front of me.
‘I’ll have to be the pastry chef,’ I say.
He flicks between channels in the ad break. ‘And I’ll be the barista.’
It’s the standard patter we run through every time a dish of his goes awry, or the coffee beans burn in our coffee machine under my watch.
‘How’s the hospital food been today?’
I nibble at the edge of the slice. It may not be his best batch, but he made it for me.
‘Awful.’
‘Then I’ll bring you in one of your favourite dishes tomorrow, okay?’
‘That would be nice,’ I say.
His eyes are soft, his hair falling across his forehead in a cowlick, his cheeks glowing under the downlights. He looks just like he did the first night we met.
‘Remember Puerto Vallarta?’ he says. ‘The incredible food?’
I nod.
It had been Mark’s idea, the trip to Mexico. I’d been hesitant – as a wholly unfamiliar destination, it wasn’t a place I would have chosen – but after several weeks of munching on enchiladas and fish tacos, lazing on the beach and exploring tiny markets, I had to admit it: Mexico had won me over. The change of environment helped me forget about Damien. As we neared the end of the holiday, I was relaxed and refreshed. Ready for anything.
A week into our trip, while we watched the sun set from the balcony of our hotel overlooking the Bay of Banderas, Mark asked me to marry him. Staring into his deep brown eyes, I said yes without hesitation.
‘Puerto Vallarta was a long time ago, Mark.’
‘Goal,’ he says with a fist pump. Then, turning from the TV, ‘I’m sorry. I should have been more understanding.’ His forehead crumples.
It isn’t clear which episode he’s referring to. His parents’ visit? His refusal to authorise the DNA tests? All the small burdens of our marriage?
‘Mum is really keen to come and stay,’ he says. ‘She can help out.’
I press my finger into the slice, feeling its solid mass.
‘Have you talked to her since the visit?’
‘On the phone. They were supposed to come to the nursery again today.’
So, he must have made the slice for them. I press the lid back on the container, sealing it tight.
As the months following the wedding slid past, as the touch of his skin no longer made me tingle with anticipation and the weight of the wedding band on my finger began to fade, things around the house began to change too. Only little things. An apple core, forgotten in the base of his backpack. A smattering of mugs perched on his desk. A clump of dirty clothes on his side of the bed.
I tried not to let it bother me. Instead, I came to realise that Mark carried unspoken expectations; that, as his wife, these tasks now fell to me. When I raised this with him, he lifted his winter jacket from where it had been strewn over the couch.
‘I do clean up after myself,’ he said. ‘I can’t help it if you always get there first.’
As the years stacked up like dominos, he began leaving wet towels in piles on the bathroom floor, forgetting to let me know when he was going to be home late from work, having a little too much when we went out for drinks. Each time I’d make requests of him, he’d promise that things would change. He did try his best, I’ll give him that. But what I failed to understand until now was that it was too late; that nothing even slightly damaged could be made brand new.
He can’t blame me for what I’m about to do.
‘Sash, I hope you know I’ll always be here for you.’ His eyes are solemn pools until a roar emits from the screen and he turns back to the scrum of players wrestling for the ball.
I stuff the baby clothes back into the shopping bag, which I shove to the back of the cupboard. These aren’t the sort of things I’ll dress my baby in. Perhaps Toby can use them instead. Toby is exactly what Mark wanted: a son to call his own.
The siren sounds, indicating the end of the match. Collingwood has lost.
He switches off the TV with a firm click of the remote.
‘Thanks for that, Sash. Maybe we’ll win next year.’ He swallows hard. ‘So, you seem better, Sash. More like yourself. Are you … I mean, do you believe Toby is ours now?’
This is it. The crucial moment I’ve been waiting for, trying to build towards. It’s why, tonight, I’ve held back on my anger, restrained myself from any rebukes. All at once I’m struck by the heavy droop of his eyelids.
‘Oh, Mark …’ The next words stick in my throat. I’ve never had cause to lie to him before, yet I seem to have no other choice. Finally the words roll from my tongue into the thick, humid air between Mark and me.
‘Toby is ours.’
‘Ours?’ His face is a mask of relief.
‘Oh yes,’ I say. ‘I know it now. Toby is, and always will be, our son.’
Eleven Years Earlier
MARK
The night I asked Sash to marry me was one of the happiest of my life. She was standing on the hotel balcony in the balmy evening air, her eyes cast out to sea, her hair tumbling down her back. I hadn’t planned to propose, but I was overcome by her beauty, her passionate spirit. With the bay stretched before us like shimmering glass, I imagined life with Sash would always be this good.
Back in Australia, I cou
ld tell my parents weren’t at all happy about our engagement. They were concerned, Mum said. Presumably fearful of my response, she wouldn’t, or couldn’t, elaborate. I would have refused to listen, anyway, to what they had to say. Sash and I began to make wedding plans for the following year. Late-summer wedding, church ceremony, reception at a local restaurant. It was sure to be a blast.
Then it happened. The letter in the mail: the request for Sash to give evidence at the inquest into Damien’s death.
She went stony after that, wouldn’t talk to me about anything. The sparkle she’d regained in Mexico faded from her eyes. Within weeks, she dropped out of paediatrics training and joined the pathology program. I was sad for her. She was great with kids and would have been a superb paediatrician. I gave gentle hints that she should stick with it, wait six months, and see if she still felt the same. She ignored me, insisting she had always wanted to be a pathologist. There was nothing I could do or say to change her mind.
We went ahead with the wedding. It was a nice day in the end. I think that’s how she’d remember it, too.
The inquest came and went. I cooked her dinners, rubbed her feet. But afterwards she remained quiet. She stopped going out at night. She stopped going out at all. She wouldn’t talk to me about anything. She was dealing with it her way, she said.
I can honestly say I never thought about leaving her. I did, however, begin to wonder if I was the right person for her; whether someone else would do a better job of being her husband. Nothing I did seemed to help. I guess I was hoping that once we had a baby things would start to improve. She’d enjoy motherhood. She’d discover how great a mum she really was. I was hoping a baby would be a fresh start.
Day 4, Tuesday Dawn
A woman beside me clears her throat. I rub my eyes. From my window, dawn is breaking in wafers of strawberry and apricot through the open curtains. Shepherd’s warning, my mother used to say. Seated on the chair beside my bed is Dr Niles. She asks me how I am.
Befuddled by sleep, I nearly launch into my ‘Toby is mine’ performance but I stop myself.
‘I’m fine, thanks.’
Dr Niles nods. ‘I apologise for being here so early. I have a few … personal appointments scheduled for today. I thought I’d catch you before I headed off.’ She tugs open the curtains. ‘And, look, about your friend – she’s been phoning me every day. Can you let her know I’ve received her messages – and could you please ask her to stop calling?’
Bec. How I wish she were here. It’s sweet of her to have tracked down Dr Niles’ number to proclaim my innocence. I know she’s only trying to help but perhaps her persistence is counterproductive. In my clinical days, phone calls from relatives and friends were often frustrating. I’ll have to ask Bec, politely, to cease hassling my psychiatrist.
‘I’m still wondering about your plans to find your child,’ Dr Niles now says.
I fix my eyes on the clouds, banks of colour piled in the distant sky. Better to say nothing. If I stay silent, there’s less I can give away. I learned this ten years ago, in the coroner’s court. As I sat rigid in the witness stand, my thighs pressed together, my fingers clenching the wooden rail, the barristers tried to trick me into letting out the truth about Damien by asking the same questions in different ways.
You don’t remember what you said to the boy’s mother?
Did you tell his parents he would be fine?
You didn’t believe there was anything wrong with him?
Snippets of half-remembered conversations had become confused with dreams and images of Damien. Where was truth? Where were lies? Unable to scan the courtroom for fear of meeting the eyes of his parents sitting upright in the front row, I referred to my notes, flipping through them repeatedly as if they contained a hidden clue to the correct answer. The barristers had stood aloft like birds of prey, ready to swoop.
Damien had a temperature?
Yes. Thirty-nine point six.
He had a rash?
I remember the rash all over his body: blanching, confluent, salmon-pink. The rash of a virus, not a life-threatening bacterium.
What led you to exclude meningococcal septicaemia as a cause for his presentation?
I settled on a neutral response. There was no evidence of meningococcal disease, either on history or examination.
Did you perform any investigations?
I didn’t believe they were warranted. I clear my throat.
Dr Niles perches on the edge of the seat, her thin eyebrows raised into points, the same as the barrister all those years ago.
‘So, how is your mood?’
If I say fine, Dr Niles will know I’m lying. If I say I’m feeling low, she’ll keep me locked up for longer. I fiddle with the fraying quilt.
‘Not so bad,’ I say.
Her gaze is resigned as she scribbles down notes. A plain gold wedding band encircles her left ring finger; strange, I haven’t noticed it before.
‘Now, perhaps we can revisit the topic of your infertility?’ she asks without glancing up.
I inhale. On this topic, at least, surely honesty is best; it’s unlikely to bring my mental state into question any further.
‘It was a challenging time.’
Dr Niles uncrosses her legs.
‘Tell me more.’ For the first time she seems interested in what I have to say.
I’m about to launch into a summary of the medical treatments Mark and I underwent – medication, injections, having Mark’s sperm put directly through my cervix and into my womb – when Dr Niles interrupts me.
‘My main question is: had you ever talked about when you might stop trying?’
I’m thinking about telling her the truth – that I was planning to break up with Mark until I fell pregnant for the third time. I even had the break-up speech all planned. Kate, our marriage counsellor, was going to be the facilitator, the conduit for Mark to understand how serious I was about the two of us having a trial separation. I wrote the speech out in longhand and rehearsed it in the mirror until I could recite it by heart.
It has all been too much, everything we’ve been through. I’ve been pretending for so long that things are fine, that I’m okay. Surely you can see we aren’t happy the way things are. A separation is the only option. I hope one day you’ll understand.
There’s a knock at my door. One of the nurses enters before I can respond, clutching an Express Post parcel. She holds it up to one of her ears, jiggling hard.
‘This arrived for you, Sasha. We had to sign for it – were you expecting something?’
I need to deflect any suspicions they might have. Perhaps it’s time for some new-mother babble. ‘How lovely. The baby toys I was expecting from my great-aunt Maude. She’s so sweet.’ I try to keep my hands steady as I grasp the package. The nurse smiles at Dr Niles as she leaves the room.
I breathe a private sigh of relief. My performance must be paying off.
‘How special that you have a close relationship with your great-aunt,’ Dr Niles says. ‘We all need family support in times of crisis. It’s a shame your own mother is not in your life.’ Dr Niles squints as the rising sun falls on her cheeks. ‘But perhaps we’ll leave it there for now. I’ll see you again tomorrow. In the meantime, Sasha, perhaps you could try being a little kinder to yourself.’ She tries to smile as she stands to leave. ‘None of us is perfect, you know.’
When she’s gone, I retreat to the ensuite, pressing my back against the door to keep it closed. My chest tightens. What a relief it will be to finally prove I’m right.
I lay my woollen jumper across the floor and tip the contents of the package onto it. There are three swabs enclosed, as well as a sterile plastic bag and consent forms. I read the instructions. One cotton swab for myself. Its sterile dryness almost makes me gag as I roll it against the moist inner surface of my cheek. I fill out the details on all the swabs and paperwork, including my home address. Now that Dr Niles is onside, I’m confident enough that I will have managed to get mys
elf discharged by Monday, when the results should arrive. I place the rest of the paraphernalia deep in my handbag, my heart a hummingbird inside my chest.
From the nurses’ desk, Ursula watches me cross the nursery, her arms folded over her chest. I shift my handbag onto my opposite shoulder, hidden from her view.
Toby’s face is whiter than it was yesterday, his toes tapping up and down like a metronome. His hands are curled against the mattress, standard newborn blue at the tips. I check his observations chart. No, he’s okay. Everything is in order.
There’s a commotion from outside the nursery. The door squeals open and a trolley is whisked in by several nurses. Dr Green hurries alongside, pressing a mask over a baby’s face. Several staff, Ursula included, follow them into the resuscitation room opposite the nurses’ station.
All at once the night of the birth comes to me. Was it really just over three days ago? It may as well have been a thousand. A memory. The ambulance ride as blood dripped out of my insides and into the sodden pad between my legs. The bleeding had stopped by the time the ambulance arrived at the hospital. I fell into a restless slumber on the narrow bed. Then, chaos. Wetness, again, between my thighs. Sheets drenched with a scarlet flood. The midwife falling silent as she examined me. Other midwives scurrying. The birth room filling with medical staff.
It’s all I can recall for now. Perhaps there will be more memories to come.
I look around. The nursery is deserted. It’s too early for visitors. This is it.
Toby is asleep as I plunge the swab into his mouth, wiggling it against the inside of his cheek. He grimaces and shuffles against the mattress. Then his eyes spring open. He begins to wail. I stuff the swab in my handbag and snap the porthole shut, dampening his cry.
No one emerges from the resuscitation room. I have more time.
I stride as fast as my stitches allow to the end of the long corridor of humidicribs, lifting quilts, peering through the perspex, inspecting faces and bodies and limbs for any semblance of my baby. She must be here. I sense her. I feel her nearby. I know I’ll recognise her as soon as I find her.
